Last Bench Malayalam Movie
'Last Bench' looks like a 'Classmates' meeting up with a 'Manikyakallu'. With plenty of memories thrown in for that extra build up of nostalgia, the film serves you a reminiscence cocktail , that for at least a few of you, might be tough to gulp down your throats.
Rasheed (Biyon), Joshi (Vijeesh), Samkutty (Musthafa) and Reji (Mahesh) occupy the last bench of a tenth grade classroom in a government high school and have no hopes of passing out of school that year. Their teachers have had it up to their necks with their antics, and along comes a new teacher Roselyn (Sukanya) who would transform for their lives forever.
Here are four men who have moved beyond their school days long back, and when they meet years later, they head back to their old classroom, dead drunk. Some people are born to live in their pasts, they say. The present holds little significance to them, as every event in their lives, every breath is correlated to a dusty context that lies buried in the debris of their minds.
It's the script that suffers from the most critical of all errors - obviousness. Added to that the sentimentality that hovers around every frame, so much so that it starts making you feel nauseous after a while, affirms that things are not likely to get any better. It doesn't really help that the group of characters that make up this story are quite superficial.
There are two fantastic scenes in the film that stand out from the rest of what you get to see on screen. The first one features the four boys adding a few letters to the cuss word that they had written on the blackboard to abuse the teacher, thereby altering it to one of the most beautiful words in the language. The second one is when years later Samkutty meets his classmate sweetheart Shahana again. Time has brought about changes in her, the foremost one being a face that has been charred beyond recognition. He doesn't hesitate twice before planting a kiss on her cheeks, much to her surprise!
These scenes however, stand in isolation, and the other threads that involve Rasheed, Reji and Joshi fail to evoke emotions of any kind. While Joshi's meeting with the teacher turns out to be overtly dramatic, Rasheed's meeting with his school adversary ends up being a comic affair. Reji and his search for his sweet heart is the frailest part of the narrative, which is neither convincing nor credible.
I found Biyon's performance the most believable of the lot, and I should say that the young actor does give it his very best. The music is pretty much appalling, and so is the choreography. Technically, there are no wonders in display either.
This story of the last benchers in school who have emerged as winners in life with deep-etched, sore and throbbing memories ruling their very existence, does not strike a chord. Believe me, there is very little fun, happening down here at the last bench.
